His rematch with Brandon Rios won’t start until Saturday night, but Mike Alvarado already has multiple cuts on his face.

A source close to the situation confirmed that Alvarado’s involvement in an altercation away from boxing in early February left the junior welterweight with three cuts on the lower part of his right cheek and another longer laceration down the right side of his neck, near his Adam’s apple. The cuts sustained during that incident obviously weren’t bad enough to force the postponement of his rematch against Rios and his handlers don’t expect those wounds to affect his performance Saturday night at Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas (HBO; 10:15 p.m. ET/7:15 p.m. PT).

The 32-year-old Alvarado (33-1, 23 KOs), of Thornton, Colo., would not say during a conference call how his face and neck were cut, but he downplayed the significance of those lacerations.

“It hasn’t hindered me,” Alvarado said. “It was just a little accident. I was just at the wrong place at the wrong time and it was a little accident. It happened outside the ring and I am fine.”

The cuts on Alvarado’s cheek and neck were very visible when he was interviewed earlier this month for “Road to Rios-Alvardo 2,” HBO’s 15-minute preview of their highly anticipated, 10-round rematch.

Keith Idec covers boxing for The Record and Herald News, of Woodland Park, N.J., and BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.

cuts or no cuts , he's going to get stopped again imo..
it's not gonna be his option to or not to brawl either, brandon will leave him no choice...good fight while it lasts and mike should thank rios for this chance....